


Bedtime as a Bonding Experience

by EdgarAllenPoet



Series: Lucretia's Volumes [My Balance Fics] [8]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, Night Terrors, One Big Happy Family, Platonic Cuddling, Sharing a Bed, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-07 08:07:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18406568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EdgarAllenPoet/pseuds/EdgarAllenPoet
Summary: “It’s okay,” Kravitz settled on, scooting a little bit away from Taako and making a space in the middle.  He pulled the blanket back a bit, patted the mattress, an obvious invitation.Lup hesitated a moment, and Kravitz worried he’d crossed some sort of line, until she whispered, “Fuck it.  Thanks.” and crawled into bed with them.





	Bedtime as a Bonding Experience

Technically, if anyone was intruding here it was Kravitz.  Yeah, sure, this was technically his house. And yes, alright, this was  _ definitely _ his bed.  But he’d been the fifth to move in here, officially, and he’d done so well after all the other occupants.  

 

Taako, Lup, and Barry were the originals.  Nobody was thrilled with the idea of staying on the moon base, but Taako was especially repulsed by it.  Even after Lucretia announced she would be spending most of her time off-base-- working on reparation efforts for all the towns affected by the relics, for anywhere destroyed by the Hunger --Taako had been quick to declare that it didn’t  _ matter _ , that the mere presence of her memory was too much, and that he was, in his own words,  _ “totes outta this joint. _ ” 

 

The more time Kravitz spent around Taako, the more he realized that some of his more, erm…  _ colorful  _ behaviors were actually coping mechanisms.  Loud unflappable confidence and vibrant borderline-aggressive vocabulary were all part of the Taaco Brand **™.**

 

Regardless, Kravitz loved  _ every _ aspect of his boyfriend’s personality.  Quirks and coping mechanisms and the like, he was just so  _ fascinating. _  So original, despite a nearly identical twin.  Kravitz loved his boyfriend, and he loved the family that was slowly allowing him into the fold. He was getting used to a lot of the aspects of cohabitation and socializing and being  _ alive _ . 

There were a few things, however, that he hadn’t managed to get used to yet.

 

Sleeping, for one.  Kravitz wasn’t phenomenally good at it.  He could do it, of course. His construct was a physical form with normal, living reactions to things.  He could bleed and become dehydrated and feel sensations, but anytime those became a problem he merely had to ‘ _ poof out’ _ as the twins called it, reform, and return in a new construct with freshly restored functions.  

 

Lup and Barry had the same powers now, a simplified version of what they’d sort of had as liches, since now they didn’t have to die to stitch themselves back together.  

 

Barry and Lup still slept.  They had many, many years of practice at it, afterall.  Taako slept too, despite the fact that he and Lup, as elves, could simply meditate and halve the time during the night.  It was some sort of comfort thing, though, it seemed. 

 

That, and apparently, the occasional bed-sharing.

 

Kravitz was wide awake and staring at the ceiling, Taako curled up against his chest and snoozing soundly, when a silhouette appeared by their bedside and nearly startled the hell out of him.  Lup, with dark vision and all that, obviously knew he was awake. Kravitz didn’t need dark vision to see the quirk of her lip in an exhausted half-smile. 

 

“Hey, bones,” she whispered, and then she was climbing into bed with them.  

 

Kravitz watched, gobsmacked, as she tucked herself in and tugged ever-so-slightly at Taako’s shoulder.  Taako rolled over instantly, fitting himself into Lup’s side and tucking her head under his chin. Lup grinned up at Kravitz in a way that may or may not have been apologetic and said, “Sorry, man.  Twin perks.” 

 

Right.  Of course. 

 

Kravitz nodded and settled down again, closing his eyes and attempting meditation if nothing else.  Half-elves technically couldn’t replace sleep with meditation, but reapers didn’t need sleep at all, and one of the few memories from his time alive was a vague one of his mother teaching him to meditate as a young man.  He breathed deep, closed his eyes, and hoped for a trance.

 

He woke up in the morning as the little spoon in a three person dishwasher, Taako’s face pressed tightly to the middle of his back and Lup’s arms draped over the both of them, resting on Kravitz’s stomach.  Kravitz blinked over his shoulder at them in the early morning sunlight and wondered about the best way to get up for coffee without disturbing either of them. 

  
  


\--------

  
  
  


“Oh yeah,” Barry said later that morning, glasses fogging up over a cup of coffee with no cream and far too much sugar.  Kravitz sipped his own, burnt his tongue, and cursed his physical construct silently. “The twins do that sometimes,” he said.  “Just a thing.” 

 

Barry, as it was, had much more time to get used to these things. 

  
  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


One night Kravitz came home from work, his mission having taken him quite a while and keeping him out late into the evening.  He’d stayed behind in the astral plane to tie the loose ends together, finish all the reports and get everything squared away so he wouldn’t have to in the morning.  By the time he stepped back into their living room, exhaustion in the back of his eyes even if he wasn’t supposed to feel it, the house was dark and silent. The grandfather clock declared it just past three in the morning.  Kravitz hadn’t the slightest clue whose grandfather it had belonged to. 

 

He hung his cloak at the door and dematerialized his scythe.  He kicked off his shoes and crept silently to his bedroom, relishing the chance to curl up in bed with his love and just  _ rest. _

 

When he got there, however, he found his bed already full.  Two bird nests of matching blonde hair nestled into the pillows, the blanket kicked away and draped lazily over their legs, which were tangled.  They were sleeping a good bit away from each other, surprisingly, but their hands were intertwined in the middle. 

 

Somehow, the two wisps of beings took the entire bed.

Well, that changed his plans a little bit. 

 

They had an extra bedroom for visitors, often claimed by Magnus or Ren or Carey and Killian, rarely used by Merle or Davenport who tended to keep to themselves, eventually reserved for Lucretia, probably. Kravitz checked in on the house first-- found Barry sprawled out snoring in his and Lup’s bed, glasses still on his face and book abandoned next to him, found Angus curled up and clutching a pillow, making the quietest content humming noises in his sleep.  The cats prowled the house, entertaining himself. Everything was in place, then. 

 

Kravitz tucked himself into the guest bedroom, stripping to underwear instead of risking making noise retrieving pajamas from his own bedroom or going through the hassle of constructing them.  The sheets were cool against his barely warm skin, and his eyes seemed to sigh happily as he let them slip shut. 

 

It had been a long day, and while Kravitz had hoped to have Taako in his arms tonight, he couldn’t fault Lup for spending quality time with her brother.  It was a twin thing, and Kravitz could respect that. Taako and Lup scarcely told the truth about their childhood, hardly told stories that weren’t for fun, but sometimes they let details slip.  Sometimes they’d drop a comment they seemed to think was  _ funny _ or  _ ordinary _ and find Kravitz frowning at something rather alarming.  He didn’t know details, but he respected their privacy, and if sharing space after centuries attached at the hip and twelve years apart brought them comfort, then Kravitz couldn’t feel any ill will over it. 

 

He was too tired to, even if he wanted to.  In rare form, Kravitz fell asleep rather quickly, and he slept in, and he woke up in the morning to a warm and sleepy elf crawling into his bed and pressing a kiss to the skin behind his ear. 

 

So it was all just as well, then. 

  
  


\--------

 

“Have sweet dreams without me?” Lup asked, leaning over the back of the couch to loop her arms around Barry’s neck and nuzzle her nose against his hair still damp from the shower.  Barry grinned at her and rolled his eyes playfully. 

 

He said, “Yeah, ugh, finally,” in a way that was both sincere yet not at all.  Lup laughed, blew a raspberry against his cheek, and reminded him to shave. 

 

It was sweet, the way they teased each other.  The dynamic they’d built from years and years together.  Like an old married couple, Kravitz mused. He wondered how long it would take for them to start shouting to each other from opposite aisle at the grocery store. 

 

Hell, they probably already did that. 

 

Kravitz reached out idly, hand covering Taako’s where it was tracing circles on the kitchen table.  Taako hummed quietly, took Kravitz’s hand in his own, and pressed a kiss to the knuckles. Something light bubbled up in Kravitz’s chest, and Taako grinned at him. 

 

Angus spoke from the doorway, saying, “With all due respect, sirs and ma’am, there are young eyes in the room, thank you.” 

 

Taako raised a pointed eyebrow at Angus and licked across Kravitz’s knuckles.  Kravitz laughed, startled, and yanked his hand back, wiping it off on his pant leg.  Taako winked at him. Angus groaned, properly disgusted. 

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


So bed sharing was something Kravitz could get used to.  Their bed was rather large. Given he got in  _ first _ , they didn’t have any problems sharing it between the three of them.  It was a rare occasion as it was, anyways, the nights far and few in between where he would wake up to the gentle jostling of the mattress and Lup snuck in.  Sometimes it didn’t wake him up at all. 

 

Other times Kravitz woke up alone, double checked the bed down the hall, and found Barry and the twins all sleeping nearly on top of each other in a way that betrayed the true familial intimacy of their relationships.  Part of him wondered if he ought to be jealous. All of him knew he wasn’t actually capable of the feelings. Not over this. 

 

So bed sharing was something Kravitz could get used to, but nightmares were a whole other story.  Sometimes they were quiet. When Kravitz was still getting used to sleeping, he’d often sit up and watch as Taako suddenly jerked awake and explored the room with wide eyes before curling up closer to Kravitz and laying very still until the dark swallowed him to sleep again.  Sometimes Taako would wake up and sneak out to the living room, and in the morning Kravitz would find him and Lup or Barry or Magnus or even Angus leaning on each other on the couch with empty mugs of milk or chocolate sitting on the floor nearby, sleepy hands too lazy to reach all the way and place them on the coffee table. 

 

The quiet nightmares were one thing.  Even Kravitz had them-- had memories of suffocating tar, sometimes of his death, sometimes of bounties that had gone awry, sometimes of fears he didn’t even know he had.  They were rare, though, and it was easy to calm himself down with the presence of the Raven Queen perpetually comforting him from the back of his mind.

 

The first night that Taako woke up screaming, however, Kravitz hadn’t had the slightest idea what to do about it.  He woke up initially from a rather savage kick to the small of his back. He grunted, rolled away, and was woken up entirely by Taako flailing wildly under the covers next to him.  

 

He sat up, reached out to touch Taako’s shoulder, and Taako had lost his shit. 

 

He jerked away from him, screamed, kicked, and flailed like he was being murdered.  Kravitz reached for him again, got an even more violent reaction, and Taako’s eyes were open but he wasn’t there.  The door slammed open and the lights flashed on and Lup was there, crashing to her knees next to their bed and wrapping her arms around her brother and holding him tight. 

 

She spoke in elvish, muttering things that made little sense to Kravitz, who stared on helplessly.  Taako came back to himself, slowly but surely, and when his breathing finally slowed it was replaced with full-body trembling.  Barry stopped by to glance through the doorway, just to double check. He shot Kravitz a sad smile and reassured Angus in quiet whispers that, “Everything’s fine, let’s get back to bed, alright?” 

 

“Can I help?” Kravitz asked eventually, scrubbing the sleep from his eyes.  Lup was still kneeling, one hand in the middle of Taako’s back and the other holding his head to her chest, fingers carding gently through his hair. 

 

“How about you make us some tea, bubeleh.” 

 

Kravitz could do that.  He crawled out of bed and made his way to the kitchen, and when he returned Taako and Lup were both sitting up in bed, pressed against each other entirely on one side, Lup’s legs throw over his lap and fingers still running through his hair.  She smiled at him as he passed her a mug. Taako couldn’t find it in him to meet Kravitz’s eye, but he took the tea and let Kravitz put an arm around them, leaned into Kravitz a little. 

 

The three of them, sharing a bed together, didn’t get any more sleep that night. 

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  
  


“It’s better, actually,” Barry explained in a whispered tone while the two surveyed a job to be done in the backyard.  Angus was scaling up a tree a short way’s away, “investigating” a bird nest he might have seen. The twins were inside, but y’know.  Superior elf hearing. 

 

“They’re quiet if they’re not comfortable around you.  They didn’t sleep a blink those first few months on the Starblaster, got by on meditation.  So sleeping at all is a milestone, and actually letting you see him have a nightmare? Even if it’s a subconscious decision, it’s still something.” 

 

Barry, necromancer and death criminal regardless, was highly intelligent about a number of things.  Interplanar physics. Summoning circles and languages of the dead. Manipulating the light of creation.  The twins. 

 

Kravitz figured it was wise to trust him on these things. 

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


This time, Kravitz woke up to only Taako’s voice whispering.  He rolled over, blinked his eyes open, and found Taako and Angus sitting up.  Angus was settled on the bed between the two of them, clutching at the collar of his pajamas like he was terribly embarrassed for being there, and Taako was speaking to him in a voice that was both exhausted and far gentler than anything he tended to use in the daylight.

 

“Y’know the king of death himself still had nightmares, my guy,” Taako whispered, making the corners of Angus’s mouth twitch slightly.  “Cuddles like a  _ baby _ , too, he thinks I don’t notice.  Sometimes getting help is okay, pumpkin.  Nobody’s judgin’ for it.” 

 

Kravitz wondered if Taako knew how ironic it was that he refused to listen to his own wisdom, but that wasn’t a conversation to be had.  Angus protested weakly that he was, at eleven years old, plenty old enough to take care of himself actually, thank you sir. 

 

And Taako retorted with, “Well I’m  _ five hundred years old _ \--” he was actually closer to one hundred thirty disregarding a century, as far as the twins could tell, though they’d never actually known their birthday.  He thought it was funny to exaggerate. “--and  _ I  _ want to cuddle, so suck it up, buttercup.” 

 

Angus gave up quickly, flopping down against the mattress and losing the battle to sleep rather quickly.  Kravitz woke up in the morning to the sound of a camera shutter, opened his eyes to find Angus tucked to his chest, Taako pressing close, Kravitz’s arms wrapped securely around the two of them, and Lup grinning cheekily from the foot of the bed. 

 

“Morning, skeletor,” she said, before disappearing out the door. 

  
  
  


\--------

  
  
  


“Do you ever remember that he’d traditionally be in elementary school?” Kravitz asked, watching Angus wrestling with Magnus in the backyard, fighting to get his magnifying scope back.  

 

Barry came to stand next to him, sipped his coffee, and bumped his shoulder against Kravitz’s.  “Trippy, right?” 

  
  
  
  


\--------

  
  


Seeing as their family had so few trepidations against sharing any and all space with each other, it was easy to develop a system: lock the door when they didn’t want to be interrupted ( _ mage hand _ ), throw up some extra noise cancellation if they needed it ( _ silence) _ , clean up promptly afterwards ( _ prestidigitation), _ and never,  _ ever _ sleep naked.  

 

It was a good system, and Barry and Lup must have had a similar one, since they’d avoided walking in on each other in nearly a year of living together.  It was only a matter of time before an inpatient twin cast  _ knock _ and caught an eyeful, Kravitz was certain, but that was a problem for the future.  

 

For now, it wasn’t a problem to grapple with.  The problem to grapple with, it seemed, was Kravitz’s long lasting curse from Pan, and the fact that he couldn’t even look at Taako’s tomato plants in the backyard without wilting them.  Taako had asked him to go out and pick a few for dinner, saying not to worry, it had been fine. The second Kravitz’s finger had touched the fruit, it had turned black and rotten, and the plant wasted away before his eyes. 

 

The best solution, he figured, was to hide the evidence.  Go back in and tell Taako to pick his own and hope he didn’t notice that there were four tomato plants instead of five.  He flattened the plant under his palm and scooped some soil out of a bag nearby to bury it properly. He had two big handfuls, hands scooped into a bowl, when someone popped into thin air behind him and smacked him on the ass. 

 

Startled by the sudden attack, Kravitz shifted full skeleton without even meaning to, and he watched in shock as the dirt sifted through bone fingers and fell onto his shoes.  He turned around to gape at Taako and found the elf sprinting off across the back yard, cackling all the way. Kravitz grinned. He took off after him. 

 

It wasn’t a long chase.  Neither of them elected to use anymore magic-- Kravitz not wanting to explain to his Lady why he was popping in and out of the astral plane at random, Taako apparently deciding to play nice for once.  He caught him out behind the garden shed, hand hooking into his arm and spinning him around, the two of them losing their balance and toppling into a heap in the grass. Kravitz propped himself up on his elbows and smiled at a still giggling Taako.  He blew a kiss on his neck, making Taako screech and kick and push at him. 

 

“Did you seriously use ‘ _ blink _ ’ for that?”

 

“Spell slots to spare, my dude.” 

 

It was easy work from there to climb to his feet and pull Taako up with him, tricking him with a peck on the lips before stooping down and tossing Taako up over his shoulder.  Taako screeched again, laughing and kicking his feet. Kravitz smacked him-- once, in revenge-- and carried him off to the house, the two of them giggling like school boys all the way.

 

He was making a plan mentally.  Toss Taako onto the bed and spoil the hell out of him, lock the door, silence the room, and take their sweet fucking time.   When they got there, though, shouldering the door open and laughter still bubbling out of them, they found their room already occupied. 

 

“Oh thank gods,” Lup said, looking up at the two of them from where she was sprawled out on their bed with a notebook and her stone of farspeech and a pen sticking out of her bun.  “Help me out, homies, Barry’s got a mystery he needs help solving. Krav, baby, take a lookat this. Taako, grab the little man.” 

 

Kravitz placed Taako back on his feet and tried not to look disappointed as he crossed the room to look at the problem Barry had at them.  He tried furthermore not to look embarrassed or guilty of anything as Lup shot him a smirk and a suggestively raised eyebrow. 

 

“Shut up,” he grumbled, and she laughed out loud, jabbing her elbow into his ribs and pushing the stone of farspeech into his hands. 

 

“Barold, say it again, I got tall, dark, and handsome on the line.” 

 

“ _ Awesome!”  _ Barry’s voice crackled through the phone.  “ _ Okay, so we got…” _

 

\-------------

  
  
  


It was Candlenights, and Kravitz didn’t realize he could get drunk until he was already well on his way to getting there.  He swirled his wine in his glass and blinked at it lazily, watching the few bubbles swirl around and around, and he wondered how the fuck this had managed to happen. 

 

It made sense-- of course it did-- physical form with a beating heart would have blood alcohol content, it figured, but the idea of that alcohol going to his head and making him dizzy was entirely bonkers.  He was more soul than man at this point. He could easily, probably, blip out for a second and come back totally sober. 

 

But he… but he didn’t actually want to.  This was kinda nice, it turned out. 

 

The house was full-- totally packed.  Lup and Taako had prepared a feast and invited everyone they knew.  The kids had turned in for bed hours ago, exhaustion wearing heavy on their young bodies.  Mavis, Mookie, and Angus were sharing a bedroom, and Angus had done his best to pretend to be excited for the opportunity to share.  He was a sweet kid. 

 

Kravitz was a little too tipsy to keep track of where everyone was at the moment, some of them in the kitchen, some of them in the backyard, a number of people still scattered around the living room.  He glanced to his left and found Magnus, who’d been drinking…  _ something, _ and was looking a little worse for wear himself.  Lucretia sat on Magnus’s other side, and well, that explained where Taako was.  He’d let Lup invite her, and he’d been civil after many threats (from his sister) and encouragements (from Kravitz) to just pretend like they didn’t have bad blood, just for one night, just for the holiday.  That didn’t mean he wanted to spend any time around her, though. Kravitz should get up and find his boyfriend. 

 

He couldn’t remember how to move his legs. 

 

“Are you okay, sir?” a voice asked to his right, drawing his attention with more slow blinks.  Angus McDonald was leaning his elbows on the arm of the couch and blinking at him much faster than Kravitz was capable of.  Kravitz hummed. He frowned. Angus was supposed to be in bed. 

 

“You’re supposed to be in bed,” he said, and Angus rolled his eyes. 

 

“I know I’m a little boy, but you guys aren’t exactly strict about bedtime,” he said, holding up one finger, and then a second as he said, “And also, you guys are loud.” 

 

They were.  The house was very loud.  Kravitz was vaguely aware of Lucretia dismissing herself to bed, of her patting Magnus on the shoulder and giving Kravitz a good night nod.  It would have been good manners to wish her a good night. Kravitz couldn’t figure out the right words. 

 

Gods damn, he’d had a bit too much to drink, hadn’t he?

 

Magnus burst out laughing next to him, loud guffaws, and his wrapped a heavy arm around Kravitz’s shoulders and pulled him close, grinding his knuckles against Kravitz’s head as he did so.  Kravitz had distant, barely there memories of a brother, or maybe a sister, maybe an uncle. It was so hard to tell, even when sober. So many memories lost to the fuckin’ ether. 

 

“Tha’s sad,” Magnus said, and Kravitz realized he’d been thinking out loud.  Angus giggled, clambered up to sit on the arm of the couch, and settled his elbows on his knees to study them.  “Is’ ‘kay,” Magnus slurred. “Plenty a’ brothers a’now.” 

 

“What?” Kravitz asked, trying and failing to squirm out of his grasp.  He huffed and collapsed against Magnus. Fine. Fuck it. Magnus was warm. Kravitz was warm.  Why the  _ fuck _ was he warm?

 

“Probably all the alcohol, sir.” 

 

“Ango’s yer’ brother, right Ango?” Magnus asked, reaching out and pushing Angus’s shoulder with what must have been far more force than he meant to use.  Angus nearly toppled off the couch, was caught by latching onto the couch cushions. 

 

“Yeah, okay,” the kid said.  “More like an uncle, though, probably.  Maybe a dad, but like, I already had a dad once upon a time.  I don’t really need a second one, and if  _ you’re _ a dad, so is Taako, and Barry, and that’s  _ four  _ dads, which is just too many dads for anyone.” 

 

“What?” Kravitz asked again, totally fucking lost.  Words had lost meeting. 

 

“We’re all brothers,” Magnus said very seriously, pressing his forehead to Kravitz’s and staring him in the eyes.  “Tha’s how it  _ works _ .  I love ya’, man.”

 

“Aw,” Angus said, grinning a little.  Time passed without Kravitz’s conscious perception of it.  Angus and Magnus got into a talk about… something. Kravitz blinked, and Angus was asleep against his side, and Magnus was drooling on his shoulder.  He blinked again, and Taako was covering them with a blanket, fond smile on his face. 

 

“Huh?” Kravitz asked, and Taako pressed a kiss to his forehead.  His lips were warm, his breath smelled of spirits, he swayed a little on his feet. 

 

“Crashing with Lup,” he whispered, kissing him again and running a smoothing hand over Angus’s head.  “He’s gonna be so fuckin’ sore tomorrow, his back is gonna be killer.” 

 

“Fantasy advil,” Kravitz replied, the only words he could think of, and then, “Love you.” 

 

Taako pressed a chaste kiss to his lips and patted him on the cheek.  Kravitz blinked, and the light was off, and Taako was gone. He blinked, and morning light was pouring through the open blinds.  Angus whined in his sleep and pressed a little closer to him. Kravitz’s eyes pounded in a headache, so he closed his eyes and leaned more heavily into Magnus, allowing himself an early morning and praying his Queen didn’t need him in the next five hours.

  
  
  
  
  


\---------

  
  
  
  
  


There were nights when Taako woke with nightmares, quiet and terrified and needing Kravitz to hold still and wait until Taako could recognize his face and stitch his memories back together.  There were nights when Taako woke up screaming, and Lup came in, and they sat together and waited it out, sometimes with Kravitz sometimes by themselves. There were nights Taako slipped out, going to Lup when she needed him, or where Kravitz woke from frightening images to Taako stroking his hair and pressing kisses to his temple and bringing him back to the land of the living. 

 

There were nights when none of that happened, where Taako meditated, or he slept just fine.

 

Then there were nights when the exhaustion set in, so thick and heavy that there was no waking him in the middle of it, nothing short of the apocalypse to stir him, and then again maybe not even that.  This was one of those nights, Kravitz’s own mind betraying him and keeping him up while Taako slept like dead weight next to him, absolutely lost to the world. 

 

Barry was gone on a job, and Angus was spending the weekend with Magnus.  He’d be going off to school soon, studying and working at Lucas’s school, and Kravitz was endlessly impressed with the boy. 

 

He sat up with a cup of tea and a case he ought to be reading if his damn constructed eyes could get a grip and cooperate.  The words blurred on the page before him though, and it was so much work to fix them that he was actually glad to see the distraction of Lup appearing in the doorway. 

 

“Hey,” he said, voice quiet even though it wouldn’t wake Taako tonight anyways.  

 

Lup replied, voice too quiet and shaking, a quiet, “Hey…”

 

And then, “...Taako?” 

 

Taako, predictably, didn’t respond.  “He’s had a hard day,” Kravitz responded, setting his paperwork and tea aside and sitting up a little straighter.  Lup didn’t respond either, shrunk back in the doorway a bit. If Kravitz really focused, he could almost see her shaking. 

 

Fuck.

 

“Hey,” he said again, “You should….” and how exactly do you offer this?  What was the acceptable way to invite your sister-in-law to cuddle with you?  It wouldn’t be a novel experience, certainly, they’d woken up entangled plenty of times.  Kravitz had woken that way with more people than he ever would have predicted before meeting Taako, and it was never a problem. 

 

But it felt strange to ask.  It felt foreign. Taako wasn’t stirring, though, and Lup was always welcomed at this point.  Of course she was. 

 

“It’s okay,” Kravitz settled on, scooting a little bit away from Taako and making a space in the middle.  He pulled the blanket back a bit, patted the mattress, and obvious invitation. 

 

Lup hesitated a moment, and Kravitz worried he’d crossed some sort of line, until she whispered, “Fuck it.  Thanks.” and crawled into bed with them. 

 

Kravitz expected her to settle down, maybe curl around Taako, and settle in for the night.  He didn’t expect her to maneuver herself under his arm, press herself into his side and prop her head against his chest.  Her hands were tucked to her chest, and it was all the more obvious now to tell she was trembling.

 

Kravitz wrapped his arm more securely around her, rubbed a soothing hand over her back the way he did for Taako, and felt her let out a shuddering breath.  “Need to talk about it?” he asked, and she shook her head. 

 

“No words for that dream shit,” she said.  “Too fucked, y’know?” 

 

Kravitz nodded.  “Yeah.”

 

“Grim Reaper has nightmares?” she asked, and he chuckled quietly. 

 

He said, “Plenty of things to haunt me.”   He felt her nod again. 

 

“Easiest job I’ve ever had,” she said, then yawned, and an arm unfurled to wrap around Kravitz’s abdomen and squeeze him tighter.  “Thanks,” she said. “It’s hard sometimes. Need someone steadier than you are, sometimes.” 

 

“Anytime,” he said.  “Mi casa, and whatever.” 

 

“Whatever,” he agreed, and somehow come morning’s light, Kravitz woke to find a twin on either side of him, the two of them snuggled tight into his sides, heads propped on his chest, foreheads nearly touching, fingers intertwined.  He grinned, pressed a kiss to the crown of Taako’s head, and enjoyed sharing the space.

  
  
  


\---------

  
  


When the twins conked out in Taako and Kravitz’s bed, after a long evening of ‘twin time,’ Kravitz considered his options.  Magnus was over, and he was taking all available space in his bed, not that Kravitz wanted to share that necessarily. Angus was home and tucked into his own bed, exhausted after the long trip home from school that he’d been determined to take  _ alone, thank you, sir. _

 

The couch was taken by Magnus’s dog, Johann, who was as stubborn as Angus was and not about to be moved.  He could sneak into bed with the twins, maybe, or…

 

“Come on, dummy,” Barry said, nodding his head down the hall and meandering off in that direction.  Kravitz rubbed his hand over his face and sighed. Fuck it. 

 

He didn’t need to sleep, but he  _ wanted  _ to.  The whole house was quiet with it, and he’d be bored if he kept himself up.  And he was  _ tired. _  Barry lent him a pair of pajama pants, and his bed was more than big enough for the two of them.  

 

When Kravitz woke up in the morning, he was pressed back-to-back with Barry, and the house was still silent.  He yawned, felt a familiar tugging in his chest signalling a call to duty, and rolled out of bed to get to work. 


End file.
